Pro Tip: Find That Lead actually has a prospector tool that can help you uncover new leads. They use LinkedIn to provide the filters and the contacts. Their email verification system works off a percentage that it’s a genuine email. They go like this:

With this method, even if you buy a list, you can still ensure you’re only sending to real email addresses. (Although I still don’t recommend buying a list.)

2. Stick to CAN-SPAM compliance

The CAN-SPAM Act is a law set by the Federal Trade Commission to protect consumers from unwanted or harmful emails.

It’s easy to avoid for simple email outreach campaigns, but it’s still important to consider. Basically, to be CAN-SPAM compliant, you should:

So if you want to have Dan help you share your article, contribute to something, or bring you on as a guest, you should compliment his music. (Note to Dan: Sorry if you get lots of compliments on your music now! People will have to find another way to your heart.)

But here’s my point:

Everyone has passions. They’re not always work – sometimes it’s a hobby, their family, their car, or something else entirely. Do a little research on their site and social media before you send your emails and you’re almost sure to get a response.

Pro Tip: You can test all of these things from within the MailShake dashboard. The easiest way is to send one version to a small segment of your list – perhaps 50 to 200, depending on the size – and another version to another small segment. Whichever one gets better results is the winner that you send to the rest of the list.

6. Create an SPF record and DKIM for your domain

By setting up SPF with your email provider, it allows email servers to cross check your domain name against your associated IP address to make sure you’re legitimate.

A DKIM, on the other hand, is a digital signature to outgoing message headers using the DKIM standard. In English, it’s basically another way to verify that your email is really being sent from you, and not a hacker or third party.

Both of these things boost your deliverability. They’re not hard to set up, so there’s no reason not to do so.

7. Check to see if you’re on any blacklists

Just like getting whitelisted is the holy grail of email marketing, getting blacklisted is email hell.

Being on a blacklist will keep your emails from ever reaching someone’s inbox. You’ll be lucky to even make it to their spam folder – you probably won’t make it anywhere.

To check if you’re on any blacklists, you can use a free tool like MX Tool Box. It will show check you against over 100 blacklists:

8. If you have a strong brand, leverage it in your “from” name

If you’ve put in the effort and a fair amount of people know your brand name, add it in the “from” field for your email sends.

For example, Nathan from CoSchedule does this with his emails:

You may have also seen “Kevan from Buffer” or “Dave Asprey | Bulletproof”. Basically, these people have built brand awareness that increases the chance they’ll get opened and responded to.

Even if you don’t have a strong brand (yet), you should still pay attention to the from field. Use your name or company name, if possible. And never send from crazy addresses like xoxo37unicorns@gmail.com. Instead, use an email account through your website.

It increases your chance even further if you create a G suite account, as gmail is a trusted email provider. (As are Yahoo! Mail and Hotmail.)

9. General parting advice for increasing deliverability

There are a lot of other little things you can do to avoid the spam folder. Rather than giving them each their own tip section, I just compiled them here for quick reference:

Don’t include attachments in your emails (duh).

Don’t send too many emails at one time – instead, drip them out over a few hours or even a few days. (MailShake does this automatically for you.)

Follow up! I’ve found that half or more of my responses came from the first or second follow-up. People are busy; email rarely ever has their full attention.

Add a strong email signature in case your lead want to get familiar with you and your content before they reply. This also helps drive traffic to your latest posts.